Demon's Slave
by icekitty222
Summary: Kaoru has just been found after running from her lover, the demon king. And maybe, a human is enough reason to cause a civil war.
1. Chapter 1

******Yay for stories of something I haven't read in ages... anyway. If you have read Angel Diary, you will see some (a) similarity. good series, highly recommended.**

She bit her lip hard enough to almost draw blood to keep from whimpering. My poor little spitfire. Normally, she was brave, but I had seen even the bravest men wet themselves as the hell hounds fed off their fear. She, a small woman chained to a stone wall surrounded by thee of them, was doing quiet well.

"You know," I purred. "I don't like it when my slaves try to run away."

"I did run away," she informed me, then flinched when a clod nose slid under her hakama to press against her smooth skin. Teeth slid over her, and she froze. The hell hounds wouldn't attack her unless I gave the commands, but she didn't know that.

"Now," I continued. "Either you can tell me why you left… or I can force it from your mind and let the hounds eat their fill." She and I both knew that not even bones would be left from that.

"Tomoe… she said that you wouldn't be able to track me to the human realm," she finished quickly as a hound sniffed at her legs. Scared, she may be, but I was ever thankful she wasn't hysterical.

My eyes narrowed at the mention of my wife's name. I whistled sharply and the hound reluctantly moved away from the warm human flesh that was their favorite food. Now I strode forward and gripped her chin between two fingers. Not hard enough to hurt her, but with enough force to make her look at me.

'Show me', I ordered from inside her mind. Our eyes met, allowing the clearest connection for the magic. The memories would still be foggy, coming from a human mind, but it would suffice.

_Laying on the floor, ribs in pain, looking up at Tomoe. Fear and hatred echoed through the memory._

_"Either you go quietly to the human realm, or your last night will be spent with my guard." The memory was slightly blurred after that, but Tomoe walked away, and my little spitfire decided she would run. Love entered at the thought of myself, and fear that I wouldn't be able to protect her from my wife._

I broke the magic, and she went limp. My arm slid around her waist, holding her up when I broke the chains. Lifting her bridal style, I mentally called a guard, and left the hell hound's pit, leaving the dogs behind to trek through the palace.

My spitfire, Kaoru, had been gone a month. She was pale, and tired, but not much lighter, for which I was thankful. The guard that met me outside my bedroom, Sanosuke, was a friend of hers and would guard her well.

"Come," I ordered, entering the room. He stopped right inside the door as I set Kaoru down on my bed, pausing the smell the skin where her neck met her collar bone. The scent that I left on her skin and her jasmine scented soap were barely detected, but still there. No other man had gotten close enough long enough to leave his scent on her. Good. I licked the skin once, then turned and left the room to deal with my wife.

My squire, Yahiko, met up with me just a few feet away from the door.

"Where is Tomoe?" I demanded.

"Her sitting room, Battousai." He had to half run to keep up with me. "Is ug- Kaoru alright?"

"There is nothing wrong with her that sleep will not cure. I had Megumi look her over when I first found her." I came to a staircase, and merely jumped to reach the top. Yahiko took two jumps, but he was improving.

I brushed my hand over my hip, and my sword materialized. My squire took the hint, and materialized his own into his hand, then slung it over his back.

I nearly broke my wife's door as I entered her sitting room. "Why?"

Tomoe looked up from her brother, Enishi, and raised an eyebrow. "It is unseemly for the king of demons to dote so greatly upon a mere human.

Enishi had been born without the moon's blessing, leaving his hair stark white. I myself had been born under an eclipse, leaving my hair fire-red… and as the one person he would never be stronger than. I would have liked the boy more if his sister had not indoctrinated him so thoroughly to her way of thinking.

"And you think the entire court does not know of you and your lover, Akira?" I demanded.

She scowled. "That is different."

My reply was very soft. "Not if you want to keep your head, it isn't." I turned and left. Yahiko waited until I was out of the room before following. I, the demon king, one so powerful that humans whispered my name in fear, was unable to control any of the women in my life. My wife plotted against me, my lover could escape me, and I was not allowed to kill the healer.

Maybe Sano was right. Maybe the month of sleeping alone had shorted my temper. But that did not change humiliating facts.

Time to go kill something.


	2. Chapter 2

I walked back into my bedroom, Yahiko behind me, to find that Sano had been foolish enough to allow Kaoru to get her bokken. I stood silently in the doorway, smirking, as I watched the demon guard get beat over the head. I had initially laughed when I learned that Kaoru's father, who had taken an oath not to kill, had developed a sword method that could defend, but not kill. It was at times like this when I saw the definite advantages. My guard lives, but doesn't like it.

Finally, Kaoru noticed me, and stopped chasing Sano around the room. She still held the bokken ready to attack, but didn't move towards me, watching warily. Sano tried to make himself invisible against the far wall, Kauro being between him and the door.

"Sano, Yahiko, leave," I ordered. Both left silently, and my spitfire tensed some more. Maybe I should have waited to set the hellhounds on her until after I had talked with her, but she would get over it. I glided towards the human woman and her teeth caught her lip, bright blue eyes watching me nervously. She backed up as I moved forward until her back hit the wall. I reached her, braced a hand on each side of her head, and leaned forward to kiss her until she clung to me weakly.

I broke the kiss, and pressed my forehead to hers. She still hadn't changed out of the dirty hakama I found her in. she had been dressed as a man, chest bound, hair pinned tightly under a hat. She could wear whatever she wanted, but I wanted to be able to feel her silky hair over my hands, so the hat was no more.

"Kenshin." She whispered my name, something only to be done in privet. In public, I was Battousai, the feared man and demon slayer, but not alone with my woman.

"Kaoru, why did you not trust me?" I murmured, trying to be gentle instead of angry. I had learned the hard way that being high handed with this woman only ended with yelling. Oh how low the mighty sank- any demon should be able to handle one human woman. Not I evidently.

She flinched. I automatically lowered my arms to brace next to her hips, making sure she didn't duck away from me. "I…"

She couldn't seem to think of an answer. I growled in frustration and guided her over to my bed, not to let her up again until she smelled of me.

XxX

My spymasters entered my office after knocking. Misao skipped instantly over to my spitfire to attack her with a hug and scold her for going back to the human realm.

"I can't protect you there!" the small, in height only, demon informed the woman now making sure none of her ribs had cracked. "At least let me know next time, 'cause if something happens to you, kingy will get mad, and when he gets mad, I have to work overtime cleaning up the bodies!"

I suppose that the idea was what was important, no matter how flawed the reasoning.

Aoshi knelt in front of my desk, Misao sitting next to Kaoru against the wall. "You needed us, sire?"

I nodded and set the document I had been reading aside. "You are well versed on the movements of my wife?"

Both spymasters nodded.

"Good. Because the next time she attempts to harm Kaoru, I am killing her and all her supporters."

Neither Misao nor Aoshi argued. They were smart, understood how I felt about my human, and knew that such a move could be pulled off. My human was not quite as sure. She half rose with shock, before finding her voice.

"You can't!" she exclaimed, voice catching enough to keep it from being a shout. She was so cute in her kimono, hair done up, thinking she could tell the king of demons what to do. "Many of the demons support her because she is from an old house, you'll lose their support…!"

"Spitfire, no such thing will occur," I soothed her. "They may not be happy with me, but no one challenges the king and gets away with it."

"And kingy here is less forgiving then most," chipped in Misao. "Plus, we can blackmail everyone else, no problem!"

Someone knocked on my office door. Ki told me it was Yahiko, so I called for him to come in. He did so, and my eyes narrowed. His lower lip was cut, and his eye was blackened. A piece of paper was in his hand, which he handed to me. I took it and read. When I looked up, he had already started healing his lip.

"My wife wishes to see me in the council room, with Kaoru." I stood, the rest standing with. "Misao, guard Kaoru, Yahiko, come. Aoshi, you are best off elsewhere."

Aoshi bowed and left. I lead the other three out of my office and to the council room. My wife sat at one end. Council members sat at both sides of the table. I sat at the head. Misao and Kaoru both knelt behind me.

Tomoe didn't waste times with preliminaries. "Kill your slave."

I decided to be difficult. "Which one? I have many."

"You know which one!" Tomoe hissed. Her perfect, graceful, female act was so fun to ruin. "That one!" she pointed past my shoulder to Kaoru.

"Why should I?" I asked. "It is not as though you have no lovers."

Akira shot me a dirty look. He was a high ranking demon who was in love with my wife. Poor bastard- another man I'd like if Tomoe hadn't corrupted him.

"Your fascination with that… thing is abnormal," Tomoe snapped.

A demon covered from head to two in bandages snickered. Shishio had had a human lover for decades, kept alive, not aging, as all humans here were- simply by eating the demon food. "Many demons focus their attention on a human. They make for better lovers- no politics."

I was the one who had burned Shishio so badly he had to wear all the bandages. The fire had messed with his mind though- he would try to kill me on occasion as thanks, but he never truly harbored any dislike of me.

"That should not be the case in a king!"

"Hoping I'll die and make you queen?" I asked. Demons had one ruler. If I had a consort, the throne would go to an heir of my choosing. Since I had a wife, upon her death, it would go to her. I was scowled at. "It does not matter. I will keep Kaoru, and you may remain silent about it."

"I will not. If you do not get rid of her, I will stage an uprising."

I smirked. "Do your worst."


	3. Chapter 3

**Hello my doves! I have two comments to reply to that would be best if you all saw the answer.**

**Yes, I know the story kinda jumps in in the middle. I carry around a little note book at school that I write in, and I wrote the first chapter of this, only without names, a while ago. I was flipping through my notebook, looking for inspiration, found it again, and thought 'that would make a good Kenshin fic'. It was going to be two parts. Now, it's not.**

**From Kaisuikage: **_Hm... This is an interesting idea. I've never thought of something like this_ **before. I wish you would explain the whole demon vs human thing though; are** **their worlds separate? Do humans only work as slaves? Do they live in a nexus** **_with different realms?_ Hopefully, I answer all that in this chapter. Thank you to all my reviewers, because at least one of you manages to tell me what to have in the next chapter.**

**It feels like these first few chapters have been information dumps, hopefully, hopefully, it will start to slow down now, but if someone wants to beta who can help with that process, I would be grateful.**

**Onto the story!**

I lay wrapped around Kaoru, my body temperature adjusted to hers. My skin was normally cooler than a human's, but I'd learned long ago humans found it unnerving to touch someone cooler then they. My fingers paused at her wrist, feeling her pulse, my nose nuzzled her neck. She once again smelled of me.

It was day out, the weak sun shining outside of the closed window. It was a new moon, so while I wouldn't be at full power tonight, I also wasn't as groggy during the day as I would be during the full moon. This left me awake with time to think.

My spitfire half woke, and I gently helped her to consciousness. Once she was on this side of awake, I started talking.

"Spitfire," I murmured, playing with her hair. "Tell me what happened in the month you were gone."

She froze, then turned in my arms to face me, pressing close to my chest. My arms went around her. Any other woman, and she would be lucky if I spent the night in her room, forget holding her. With Kaoru… well.

"Tomoe took me to the portal between the realms. She didn't want to raise the suspicion of why a human was leaving the realms instead of entering. It felt," she shivered a little. "I had forgotten the differences between the realms. It was warmer there.

"The portal let me out just outside of a small village. I guess they're used to seeing demons pass through, which is why the town never got too big. I basically told the truth- one demon wanted revenge on my master, so I got sent through to portal to irritate him. The priest lectured me for half an hour on how, even if I had been a slave, I was now in the human realm, and we did not refer to the demons with any terms of respect. This was after they made sure I wasn't a demon myself." Her eyes flicked to my ears and teeth, both slightly more pointed than a human's.

"I didn't know where I was…" she didn't quiet see me for a moment. "Did you know, you caught… found… met me five years ago? I'm 23 now, and I don't look as though I've aged."

"This realm doesn't feel time the same way the human realm does," I told her. "You won't age for a long time."

She blinked, coming back to herself. "Yes. Anyway, they lent me some clothes. Men's clothes, though they weren't happy about it. I traveled for a week, found a village dojo that wanted an assistant. That's where I was when you found me. Over all, it was a dull trip. Or should have been, if I wanted worried about some demon finding me."

And to show me how grateful she was for me to take her _again_ from a peasant's life, I still had the bruises. We both knew who would win in a real fight, but that didn't cause her to back down, giving her half her charm.

My fingers danced over her naked skin. Her eyes started to close. Just as I thought that she was asleep, she whispered, "Kenshin?"

"Yes?"

"The Battousai hasn't been seen in five years."

I stiffened a little. "I am aware of that." My voice held a dangerous note.

She nuzzled against my chest a little. "I'm glad."

Once she was deeply asleep, I pulled away from her, and looked down into her face. She looked… peaceful, as she hadn't when I found her mere days ago in the human realm.

She was probably the only human, demon, or angel who could even sleep in the same room as I.

I got out of bed, pulling on just enough clothes to be considered dressed, and grabbed my sword before leaving the room. My eyes flicked to the guard in the hall, a silent warning that nothing was to reach my spitfire. He nodded in reply. My guards were second only to I, leaving me confident enough to trust them to do their job.

I paused a few doors down from where my room was and paused. Yahiko slept deeply… but not alone. Tsubame was with him, a shy little maid that Yahiko followed like a puppy.

I decided not to go in and wake him up. The girl already had a hard time looking me in the face.

Continuing along the hall, I met up with no one. Only when I was outside, feeling the sun wash over my skin did I see anyone. The sun wasn't… unpleasant, but it didn't give me power as the moon did. I stepped out of its way though, under the pavilion where my wife sat.

The tea wasn't poisoned, but I didn't expect it to be. The human slaves, more practical during the day, bowed to us before getting out of earshot. Demons servants knew everything. Human slaves made a point to know nothing.

"I assume you had a reason for wanting to meet like this?" I asked, sipping the tea.

"Do you want to watch half of the demons under your rule be killed off in a civil war?" she asked.

I laughed. She looked… not shocked, but not pleased, and I smirked. "You don't know me as well as you once did. The only one I care about in any realm is currently sleeping in my bed. For Kaoru, I will destroy anything. Anyone else can die, and at best I will bury them. Mostly, I will just laugh. Even you."

"Yes," she murmured. "The only demon woman powerful enough to stand beside you. The one who looked like a queen. And you are right, I do not know you as well as I used to. Not even ten years ago, there was no one for who you would destroy the worlds for. You would get revenge, certainly… but then you would be satisfied." She smirked. "How low the mighty fall, to love a human."

I sipped my tea. "Better than loving you. I'm amazed Akria still lives."

"You will bore of your human before I bore of him," she challenged.

"You don't have that kind of attention span. Enough of this. You mean to challenge my rule, raise an army, and rip the country in half."

"No. I mean to play politics until your human stabs you in the back, and take over from there, while everyone else is saying how you deserved it, from the lowest maid to your squire."

I smirked again. "I wish you luck. I may even execute you by my own hand."

"You could not risk it, and just get rid of the human," she told me.

"No."

"Then to war we go, King Battousai."

I saluted her with my tea and finished off the drink.


End file.
